Full Dark, No Stars
by AIs4Awsome
Summary: Newfoundland, 1972. Eighteen year old Rheanne Murphy is going for a late night run when she meets Fish, a boy with sharp teeth who may or may not be human. Sorry summary sorta sucks...


Webbed hands, black scales, pointed teeth.

Shelved memories of bedclothes wrapped tight around the head.

Pounding fists.

Whispered threats, shattering pain.

Smell of cigars, shoe leather, smoke.

A weighted burlap sack thrown from the window of a passing car.

Water, water.

Voiceless sceams, exploding waves, fractured light

An ocean grave, frigid wet.

Drowning.

Blackness.

Nothing.

October 1972, Newfoundland

It was a mean old night, the night I first met Fish on the rocky shores of Crow's Landing. Witch's Brush the old timer's call it, that early autumn storm that comes with the fury of October winds, transforming the calm, placid ocean into a living thing, shaking and writhing as if trying to rid itself of the shacks, wharves and boats that cling like barnacles to the island's desolate landscape. Muscles bunching, I heave open the bedroom window, let in a spray of wind and salt water. The briny sting of the ocean fills my nostrils, burns the back of my throat as I lean my head out the casement. A chafing wind whistles round the house and smacks me clean across the face with it's icy hand. I shiver.

"Mum's gonna skin you alive if she catches you sneakin' out again." my older sister Emily warns over the tinny sound of the record player. Arching her cat-like limbs in a yawn, she takes a long, slow drag from her cigarette, throws herself back against the pillows on the double bed. Tendrils of smoke flare from her nostrils, veil her pebble-colored eyes. "Last time you ruined the hardwood, remember?"

I ignore her, focusing instead on keeping the harsh wind from blowing the window closed. I can't risk getting locked out again, not tonight. To the tune of Simon and Garfunkel's _The Boxer_, I hoist myself up and over the sill, allowing my belly to skim along the splintering wood of the window's ledge. I drop with a solid _thud_ to the ground below, swallowed whole by the waiting night. The darkness surges forward, smooths itself over me. I pause, rise to meet it like the head of a worm before scurrying round the corner of the house to break the wind. Half walking, half jogging, I automatically duck below the thin shard of light spilling from the screened-in-porch where Mum and Dad sit watching the storm play out. A wave draws back like a hand and touches the shallow embankment that separates the small knot of houses from the ocean. Seething white froth washes over my bare feet, numbs my toes, sloshes back into the roiling blackness.

Sometimes, I find myself wondering what it must be like to live inland, away from the wet, wind and fog the sea heaves across our small island on a daily basis. I try to imagine what it must be like to feel warm and dry all the time, but my mind stubbornly refuses to allow itself to accept something so foreign, so completely unknown to me. Tonight I would not wish for the impossible. Hunching my shoulders and jamming my hands into my pockets, I crouch behind the woodpile stacked against the house. The towering logs form a solid barrier from the wind and rain, leaving me relatively dry from the bursting waves, the gnawing sea. I don't stop. Feet slipping over sand and rock, I pick my way westwards towards the edge of the embankment. Overhead the gulls circle, sifting white in the dark. They scream their haunting cries - a sound best heard by the solitary. A not unpleasant chill rolls through my stomach and I break into a half sprint, feet slapping loudly against the cold, lumpish pebbles.. Rain spits crudely in my face, wind whips my long hair from the confines of it's braid. A thought drums at the back of my mind to the rhythm of my pounding feet but quickly pushes it's way to the forefront, impatient. I'm not stupid. I know full well that if Mum catches me sneaking out again she'll put a childproof lock on the window, the sort of lock that not even a seventeen year old on the honour role could crack. The ever-present risk of being found out hangs over my head like a vinegar filled balloon, only adding to the intoxicating thrill that goes hand in hand with willfully disobeying my parents.

Moving through the sinking wet, I take care not to venture too close to the surf. Despite living in such close proximity to the sea, I live in fear of water, can't swim to save my life. When I was a kid, Dad would throw me again and again into pools, brooks, rivers and surf, with the sort of twisted hope that one day I might take to it. While I still can't say I can pull off a half-decent dog paddle, I now have the uncanny ability of differentiating the taste between bracken and waterweed. It's a long running joke in Crow's Landing; Rhee Murphy, the fisherman's shore-bound daughter. It would be hilarious except for the fact that it's not. To me the ocean will always be a lonely - and occasionally terrifying - monster. Keeping my fears in check, I stay a good few feet from the water's edge as I jog by my father's favorite place to fish - a long wooden dock that jetty's out to the far edge of the bay. Hugging the fog-wreathed harbor directly across from the dock is Swanson's Cannery, an ugly lead grey building that sticks out like a sore thumb amongst the loudly colored houses dotting the rocky knoll. The doors are locked tight and no light filters from the high shuttered windows. The factory could be hit by a tsunami and never budge, despite being older than Mr. Delaney, the ninety-eight year old deaf man who lives on the top floor of the Duneskey's Inn on Mummers Street. Only the dwellers of Crow's Landing's poverty-stricken underbelly work there, poor bastards forced into manning the island's dirtiest jobs.

I stop dead at the sound of someone yelling from further down the beach. The voice is faint, distant, unrecognizable. For one brief, horrifying moment, I think it's Mum; Emily's gone and fessed up that I've snuck out for another late-night run and now she's come to drag me home. It wouldn't be the first time, nor the last. My first instinct is to hide but somehow I force myself to stay calm. I close my eyes, hold my breath and strain to hear. Silence slips up on me, filled by the white-capped surf slapping against the shore. Ten seconds pass, then twenty, before the voice's deep baritone becomes clear. A man. A wave of relief seeps over me and I relax. Probably just a lobstercatcher. They have a camp on the opposite side of the bay, not far from our house. When the sea is quiet, we hear them, cursing at the lobsters and their traps. I'm heading off again when another voice breaks in over the crashing, like a TV program suddenly coming off of pause, louder this time. There's still that tell-tale baritone but this ones thin, reedy, like how I'd imagine a girl posing as a guy would sound. A two-syllable word carries over the wind but try as I might I can;t make it out. A name maybe?

It's then that I hear it, the slow-moving footsteps coming from somewhere behind me, near silent in the shifting sand. As I go to turn, a hand snakes out from the darkness, clamps firmly over my mouth, smothering the scream welling up inside me. I feel the sharp blade of a knife scrape against the base of my throat, dull and rusted. The smell of sweat and salt fills my nostrils as strong arms drag me to the other side of the now-steep embankment. Frigid water gushes round my ankles, rises to mid-calf, hampering my limbs and turning my movements clumsy as my brain switches to panic mode.

"Make another sound an' I swear to God I'll kill you." a voice, no doubt male, rasps in my ear. The voice is low, guttural, as if not accustomed to being used. I don't recognize it, which terrifies me more than the knife at me throat. Save for the occasional fogbound fisherman or wandering husband or wife brought to the island to keep the blood lines clean, strangers are rare to Crow's Landing.

I twist savagely against his hold, desperate to escape. His hand leaves my mouth long enough to shove me awkwardly to the ground. Frigid water floods over me, enters my mouth, my nose, my ears and I'm gripped by sudden, overwhelming terror. Blindly I rake at his arms with my nails, try to claw through the fabric of his shirt. Raw panic beats against my skull like a caged bird as I try to blink the stinging salt water from my eyes while kicking like a mad woman. The hand on my neck loosens a little and I pray against the odds weighing heavily against me that I'll make contact with a vital organ. One of my blows is met with a sharp gasp of pain and roll away, frantically heaving myself up and out of the water with shaking arms. I stumble to my feet but a hand grips my ankle, pulls me back and I hit the sand, hard, causing the wind to get knocked out of me. With solid hands he rolls me over onto my back and I feel a sudden weight on my chest, pressure on my arms. I see the glint of the knife, shut my eyes. I know what's going to happen next.

Then, the voice looming above me, marred by surprise. "You're a girl?"


End file.
